


Lance of the Day

by Makinoi



Category: Voltron: Defender of the Universe, Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Gen, Lance is alone, Lance is injured, Plants, minor betrayal
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-31
Updated: 2017-10-20
Packaged: 2018-09-21 01:44:00
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 11,958
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9526322
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Makinoi/pseuds/Makinoi
Summary: A very self indulgent fanfic about Lance surviving alone, missing home, crying, bleeding and being saved by his friends.





	1. Helpless

Space is a quiet place. You don’t really know how quiet it is until all the machineries stop humming and all the people are quietly sound asleep. That’s what Lance thought as he sat at the command center where Allura usually stood controlling the castle during their space jumps or battles. Staring out into the deep dark void of space he reached his right hand and clutched his left arm. The makeshift bandage over his arm held his deep wound together as he tries to stop the bleeding from the gash.

Around him, injured and unconscious on the floor, were the other Paladins, Shiro, Pidge, Keith and Hunk. Whereas, Coran and Allura were out cold too but they were at the wall beside the exit placed slumped against each other.

 

Lance slowly and painfully got up and with a small limp started to move towards the exit of the command center.

The doors were tightly shut due to the absence of power in the castle. Lance sighed and using his bayard he transforms it into a gun and shoots the slight opening and then wrenches the door open with as much strength he has.

 

The metal of the door creaks and moans and Lance opens a big enough space for him to squeeze through. He falls to a knee, gasping after the exerted effort had caused his injury in his arm to bleed again.

 

“Crap…”

 

Lance clutches his injured arm again while slowly rising to his feet once more he slowly makes his way down the hallway.

Blasting another door open, this time really blasting it down, he makes his way to his bedroom. Once he pries himself through the door he spends no time dragging his desk across the doorway and then collapsing onto the ground from fatigue. Feeling safe but terribly injured Lance finally settles down.

Lance collapses on his right side of his body, panting. His body riddled with bruises, cuts and the two large wounds. His breathing ragged and short, Lance’s consciousness finally gives way.

 

What Lance saw was the nightmare that happened after the he returned to the castle from the newly Galra relinquished planet of Dalver.

Lance having had falled in love with the rain that wet the planet of Dalver’s plant life and ground, Lance decided to stay back on the tropical-like planet for a little while longer. When he returned and walked towards the command center and announced his return strongly his arms thrown upwards with a wide grin and an obnoxiously loud, “Lance is back! Did ya’ll miss me when I was gone??”

 

But his smile broke when the other Paladins stood in a sort of circle and they had their bayards out. In the middle of their circle an unconscious Allura and Coran were in tied up and slightly injured.

 

“Guys! What happened?!” Lance freaking out at the tied up princess and Coran, quickly rushed to untie the tied two until he was slashed deeply by Keith’s sword.

Lance jumping back and wincing at the sudden attack by his teammate, he yells “Dude what are you doing?!”

This time Pidge’s katar grapples and wraps itself around Lance’s neck, pulling him down to the floor quick and hard.

 

Not yet recovered from the sword slash and heavy drop to the ground Lance is then gripped by the collar of his battle armour by Shiro’s Galra altered arm and thrown hard, his chest slamming hard against the wall, knocking the breath out of him.

 

“How did you get in here, Galranian?!” Shiro yelled after quickly pinning Lance against the wall with his robotic arm against Lance’s throat and straddled on top of Lance, holding him down with the weight of his body.

 

“Sh..i..ro…” Lance squeezes out of him with what breath he has, “…it’s me…Lance…”

 

“Tell me!” Shiro didn’t respond to Lance’s rugged speech.

 

“Shiro! The Blue Lion is back but there isn’t any sign of Lance!!” Hunk yelled back from checking the security system.

 

Turning back to the pinned Lance, Shiro sternly asks, “What did you do to Lance?! Tell me!”

 

Lance’s brain puts everything into perspective and sends one signal to his entire body.

_You need to move._

He needed to get Coran and Allura to safety but he couldn’t do it without possibly hurting his friends. They were obviously being controlled but Lance needed for them to either wake up or risk hurting them to save their butts.

 

That’s when Keith strides over and in the most unlike Keith way whispers something in Shiro’s ear, who then gets up and moves towards Pidge and Hunk who were tapping away at the command board. Keith then drags the weakened Lance over by the hair to the center where Allura and Coran were tied leaving a profusely bleeding Lance next to the captives.

 

These were _definitely_ not his friends. Nor were they aware of what they were doing.

 

Lance needed to do something but he knew that he didn’t stand any chance against the four Paladins all at once.

 

The four other Paladins had their backs turned away from them.

 

 _Bad move guys_. Lance thought as he slowly and as quietly as he could reach for his bayard.

That’s when Lance made his decision.

Lance pulls his bayard out and as it quickly transforms into his gun, he takes aim and fires at the Paladins.

The first blast knocks Shiro square in the shoulder where his robotic arm was, blasting him over the computer that he was just looking over. Then just as quick at the blast hits Shiro, Lance takes aim again. This time at Keith’s hand holding onto his sword and then at his chest knocking him breathless and on the ground.

At this point Pidge and Hunk are on their feet and dashing towards Lance.

Pidge shoots her blade towards Lance mercilessly aiming for the kill. But Lance, quick on his feet, dodges the blade, which then lodges deeply into the ground where he once laid. It doesn’t take Lance long for him to shoot her too, this time he shoots her in the stomach knocking her back further than he expected and landing on Keith who was unconscious at this point.

Having concentrated on taking Keith then Pidge down, Lance had lost sight of Hunk who had his large blaster powered and aimed. Upon hearing the sharp pitch of Hunk’s blaster powering up, Lance quickly spun around and took aim and fired twice. Their shots went off almost simultaneously, but while Hunk couldn’t avoid the small quick shots that Lance had fired, Lance realized that Allura was still groggy and Coran was still out cold.

Just as Hunk’s shot was closing in, Lance turned his back towards the blast, shielding Allura and Coran in the process.

What felt like a never ending slow motion sequence was over in an instant. Hunk was out cold slumped against the wall. Having hit his head relatively hard on the metal of the castle wall after being shot twice, once in the chest and the second in the abdomen.

 

That’s when Allura woke up.

Lance, barely keeping his consciousness, looked at Allura and with a slight pained smile asked, “You doing ok Princess?”

 

“Lance! You-”

 

But before Allura could say anything a loud battle cry was charging towards them. Shiro’s arm glowed a vibrant purple as he leapt and was coming down hard for an attack.

Lance shoved Allura and Coran with one arm and blocked Shiro’s heavy attack with his blaster.

Adrenaline rushes through Lance’s veins, numbing the pain of the Hunk’s blaster gun but the gash from Keith’s sword from earlier was weakening his resistance to Shiro’s attacks. Lance manages to shove Shiro off but Shiro’s quick footwork landed a solid kick to Lance’s side. Letting out a pained yelp, Lance is flung backwards towards the entrance of the command center and is almost knocked out cold.

Shiro begins to move towards Lance’s limp body when Allura, who had freed herself using her superior alien strength, rammed Shiro straight into the wall making a dent in the wall while kicking him out of the battle and slumped just beside where Hunk was.

 

Allura dashed over to where Lance was, a worried expression filled her face.

 

“Lance are you alright?! Lance?!”

Cradling Lance in her arms, Allura calls Lance awake.

Lance dazedly blinked his eyes open and smiled, “I am now that I’m in your arms.” Allura drops Lance but helps him pull himself up from the ground.

He was pale and sweating profusely and in dire need to get into the healing pod.

 

“Where’s Coran?” as Lance says, Coran groggily walks towards Allura and Lance rubbing his head and back.

 

“Princess? Lance?!” Coran looked at Lance’s battered form and rushed towards him. “What happened?”

 

“I don’t…I don’t know…I was hoping you knew.” Lance looked at Allura and then at Coran.

 

“We don’t know either. One moment we were checking the ship for damages and the next thing we know we were out cold and tied up and you were shooting the Paladins and now your injured-“ Coran stopped talking abruptly and suspiciously studied Lance’s face.

 

“Lance. Why _were_ you shooting the Paladins?”

 

That’s when Allura shouted. “Coran get away from him!”

 

Lance and Coran spun their heads quickly towards her but Coran spun his head back towards Lance as just as quick.

 

Coran yelped and begun backing away and Allura holds herself in a fighting pose.

 

“So the Galra have found out how to disguise themselves, huh?”

 

“Wait what?! Allura it’s me! Lance!”

 

Lance’s words fell on deaf ears though as Allura quickly threw a series of punches and kicks. Each kick and punch severely weakening Lance’s already weak body.

Lance managed to dodge one of Allura’s attacks long enough to aim and take fire at Allura.

Clenching his teeth the blast hits Allura in the shoulder just above her right breast. This causing Coran to panic and rush to her side as she falls to her back in pain.

The recoil this time knocking Lance’s weak body off his feet.

Coran visibly upset that this Galranian had shot Allura, begins to charge at Lance and at this point Lance was so weak that Coran could probably take him down.

With the little adrenaline left in him Lance gets up and slams his gun into Coran’s face, knocking him out cold. Lance dragged Coran towards the wall next to the exit and turned to Allura who was clutching her pained shoulder.

Lance had hit a soft spot in her armour, damaged from the battle with the Galra either by pure luck or by pure accident.

 

“I…I’m sorry…Allura…I-” Allura loses consciousness as Lance stutters. His eyes begin to pool but he doesn’t let it fall. With what little strength he can muster, Lance gently drags Allura’s body and props her up next to Coran.

Lance looks around the room for some cloth to quickly bandage Allura’s wound but decided that Coran wouldn’t mind that his pants be torn to help out the Princess.

Limping over to where Pidge’s katar was he picks up the short blade’s handle from the ground and reels it over.

He then limps back to Coran and tears the left side of his pants . He wraps the cloth tightly around his arm and ties it off with his teeth. Then he tears Coran’s right side of his pants and wraps it around Allura’s chest, wrapping it just tightly enough that the blood wouldn’t seep but not too tight that it cuts off her breathing.

 

Nothing can go any worse than right now. And what happens next was just the topping of the cake.

The castle’s power cuts off. All of it.

 

The sudden cut of power sent a piercing silence throughout the castle echoed and rung throughout the emptiness of command center.

 

Blinking his eyes open Lance found himself on the floor of his bedroom floor, his body aching from the bruises and the wounds.

Groaning he dragged his aching body towards his bed and buries himself in the bed’s warmth and fall back asleep once more.

 

When he wakes up again, Lance gets up slowly as he holds his head in his hands. He’s less dizzy from the lack of blood but his body is sore and he can feel the bruises swelling.

Unable to take off his armour just in case his crazed hallucinating friends come back and attack him Lance achingly drags himself to the corner of his bed facing the door with his gun pointed straight at the door.

 

And he just waits and thinks. Thinks about what has happened in the last hour and tries to figure out to what caused this crazed behavior in his comrades.

 

_Was it the plants in Dalver? Was it the atmosphere? A new Galra tactic? Why wasn't I affected? Why? Why? Wh...y...?_

 

Lance clenched his eyes tight. Hoping to wake up. Wishing that it was all some kind of horrible dream.

But he opened his eyes to see the shoddily barricaded door, his gun and the smell of dried blood in the air.

Loneliness and the painful betrayal overflowed through Lance. Tears pooled and fell from his eyes his chest tightening as he heaved and choked on his snot and tears.


	2. Reality

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A very self indulgent fanfic about Lance surviving alone, missing home, crying, bleeding and being saved by his friends.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> What's really going on.

With eyes closed, tears streamed down Lance’s face like raindrops on a window. His body limp and held up by thick vines and leafy creepers against the cold cave stonewall. Crowning his head was a ring of small oval shaped, slow blinking lights, which were embedded in the thick vines that wrapped around him.

Surrounding him from behind a blue translucent shield were large groups of Dalverians scanning and prodding the vines that held Lance strapped against the wall. The Dalverians skins resembled tree bark, overlapping and protruding wood with small twigs and branches coming off their shoulders and head. Their “hair” is leaves that resembled the willow tree but instead of straight forms, it curled and bounced. Dim glowing moss grew around their cracks giving a sense of location as their forms blend into the darkness of the night and of the foliage of the thick Dalver environment.

Ringswood, one of the lead Dalverian soldiers who assisted the Paladins with their battle against the Galra forces, walks over guiding four young Paladins to the stone cave. Using an enhanced glow from the moss-like light source that shone from the cracks and openings of his body, he stops and turns to the four Paladins with a stern but worried look in his eyes he speaks to them.

 

“By the time Garthwood found him he was already too deep for us to physically pull him off the vines.” The Dalverian, Ringswood, gestured towards one of the Dalverians to come over.

A smaller Dalverian just a little bit taller than Pidge walked up to the Paladins. Her demeanor while her body was smaller and shorter than most of the Dalverians, she gave off the impression that she definitely wasn’t a lower ranked Dalverian.

“You are the Paladins of Voltron?” She spoke with a quick but slightly nasally deep voice.

 

“We are.” Shiro steps forward and answers.

 

“I must first thank you for your help in releasing us from the hands of the Galra forces.” Garthwood says as while glowing an iris light twice, a Dalverian equivalent to a handshake or bow, while looking at each of the Paladins in the eye and sharing a small but thankful moment before looking her eyes turns down and dark.

Garthwood turns to Ringswood and asks “What of the Alteans?”

 

Ringwood jerks his arm and gestures with what looked like a thumb and says “Iornwood is bringing them over. They travelled back to their ship after looking through the Trops.”

The Trops were their version of a city. It laid in the plants among the thick sections of the plant life. A labyrinth of bridges and ramps intertwined with vines created a network of pass ways to the different houses, shops, official centers and community hall.

 

“They should reach here in twenty decaticks or so.” Ringwood continued. “You should explain to them first. I’ll fill the Alteans in once they reach.”

 

Garthwood nodded and turned to the Paladins gesturing them to follow her.

 

As the Paladins walked over to the deep stone cave a musky iron coppery stench filled the stone cave. Walking down the deep cave, groups of Dalverians of all sizes, short, tall, lean, small and broad. All of them carrying a wooden like machinery back and forth with documents flying from Dalverian to Dalverian. Pidge, upon asking whom these group of Dalverians were, Garthwood answered.

 

“They are our jarelibelsis.”

“Ja..ja..rallibey..is?” Pidge squints and scrunches up her face at what basically is alien gibberish.

 

“Uhhmm...”

 

Garthwood thinks hard at a word but when she’s unable to conjure up a word to describe she lifts her hand and places it down on Pidge’s head. Her eyes quickly scanned a light green and she lifts her hand from Pidge’s head and says “Scientists. Researchers. Mechanics. That is what I have determined from your language to be the closest to what jarelibelsis are.”

 

“Whoa, was that the learning scanning thing that Ringswood did to be able to speak to us?!” Pidge, eyes sparkling and in awe curiously says.

 

“Ah you mean the Ulmbred? Yes, yes. I just did a quick look at your knowledge.”

 

Before Pidge could ask more, Keith steps forward and gestures to the jarelibelsis they were just talking about.

 

“Are they here to save Lance?” Keith asked.

 

“They are here to help but they aren’t sure if saving is a thing they will be able to do.”

 

The group goes silent and with a small gesture Garthwood continues to guide the group to Lance.

 

After walking for about five minutes through the cold a dimly lit the limp and ensnared Lance came into their view. A wave of immense fear rushed over the Paladins as worry grew on their faces. The four boys were motionless as they felt their stomachs drop.

 

Garthwood solemnly turns towards them, arms crossed behind her back and speaks,

“Forgive me, Paladins but…this is the state that your friend, Lance is in. However before you approach I must explain. It is vital that you listen and you listen well as you could end up like your friend here. Firstly, do not approach the vines.”

Suddenly, Garthwood quickly flashes a blinding sunset orange to which the Paladins naturally reacted to by shutting their eyes and slapping their hands and arms across their faces.

 

Garthwood turns towards Lance, with her back turned to the Paladins.

She begins to explain.

“Secondly, this here is the dolero plant. It is a plant that hunts and captures its preys using its vines embedded with lights that you see wrapped around your friend’s head. The dolero attracts its prey using the lights wrapped around Lance’s head.” She points to the glowing crown for the Paladins to see.

“Usually it hypnotizes the prey and slowly draws them close enough to ensnare the target.”

“Once the dolero plant has its prey close enough to its light, it will being wrapping its vines and roots around its prey, entrapping them. Those that are captured by the dolero plant are usually slowly drained of their lifeforce while they enter a vivid dreamlike state. Sometimes depending on how vulnerable the prey’s mind is, wounds such as bruises and deep cuts appear on their body. The problem we have is that we’ve never had to release a non-Dalverian before. We don’t even know what scale of damage to the mind the dolero plant does to humans.”

 

“How do you free the Dalverians then?” Pidge quizzically asks.

 

“Dalverians have skin that sheds every ninety ticks. Usually we would wait awhile their skins start shedding and we can usually pull them off leaving their old barks behind.”

 

“I…don’t think Lance’s skin peels….” Hunk jokes. Innocently trying to lighten the mood in place of the usual jokester. That role though, is a hard one to act.

 

Unconsciously furious Keith says, “What are we supposed to do then?!” to which he and the group are taken aback by, but he quickly apologizes.

 

Shiro places his hand on Keith’s shoulder to help calm him down. After feeling Keith’s shoulders loosen up Shiro softly but audibly speaks, “Do you have any idea how we can get him free then?”

 

Garthwood who was still a little jump by Keith’s sudden outburst quickly composed herself again and cleared her throat. With a stutter she says, “N-no no no no no no no. No, no. It isn’t that we cannot save him. We can. In fact we might be able to drag him out of the dolero’s grasps. The issue is his wounds. If we were to pull him out like we usually do to Dalverians, we would risk his wounds worsening and possibly his skin ripped off.”

 

The thought of more blood on top of the exposed muscles and ripped skin didn’t settle well in Hunk’s imagination, as he catches a little barf in his mouth before swallowing it back down again.

 

Garthwood then turns to the scientists and asks them a quick question in the Dalverian tougue. After a few moments Garthwood waved the Paladins closer and they approached, treading carefully.

 

“Oh, yes, don’t worry. The scientists have placed up a shield that burns the plant if the system detects any change in motion in the plants when they set up a temporary base here. Still better safe than getting your lifefirce drained by a semi-carnivores alien plant right?” Garthwood laughs as she noticed the growing nervousness in the Paladins.

 

As they stood in front of a passed out and heavily injured Lance, catching their eyes was a large gaping wound on his left arm as they notice the substantially sized puddle of blood pooled on the ground right under the gash on Lance’s arm.

The next thing they notice is the amount of bruises on his person that have turned a sickly blue black amongst his heavily ripped and damaged blue spacesuit armour.

 

“Those injuries…were made by the plant…?” Hunk questions.

 

“To be more accurate…it is Lance’s mind that is hurting his body…” Garthwood sadly corrects him.

Instantly, Hunk regretted asking as he sees Keith, now even more worried then ever, sway slightly with his eyebrows knotted and his heart dropping. Pidge holds Keith steady, her hands slightly trembling too. Shiro bites his bottom lip and clenches his fists thinking to himself, “ _We should’ve waited for him…_ ”

A grim look casts over the Paladins one by one. Allowing the Paladins a moment to themselves Garthwood goes over to the group of jarelibelsis and asks for one of the analyzer-like machines from them.

 

After a few clicks and clacks a transparent frame with alien gibberish, a body chart pops up onto a holographic screen. Garthwood returns to the Paladins and continues to explain to the group of the state of Lance.

“According to what we have analyzed so far the plant doesn’t seem to be draining him of his lifeforce but according to the information I gathered from your mind Pidge, I have determined his human body is mental body is in fact taking damage as well which is causing this massive transfer of injuries to his actual physical body.”

 

“Which means whatever he’s dreaming about isn’t a dream but a nightmare,” Keith says. He frowns at his own statement and burrowing his eyes to the ground. Unable to look at Lance’s injured body much less imagine what horrible nightmare he was experiencing.

 

It’s at this time that a familiar Altean voice echoes through the cave.

 

“We heard everything from Ironwood and a little of what you just said and I think I may have a perfect idea that will save Lance with out turning him into a peeled Gugu fruit.” Coran’s voice echoes to the group with a semi-upbeat tone.

 

As Shiro and Keith followed by the rest of the group, turn at the words that brought about a glimmer of hope of saving Lance. Coran smiled his eyes sparking with a flame of determination and Coran says, “Healing pod.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> First off thank you so much for all the love you've given to the first chapter!  
> Honestly it took me by surprise. So thank you for all the love so far!  
> This was a hard chapter to write just cause of the setting hell I made for myself but I hope you stick around to see where I go with this.  
> Hope you enjoyed it.


	3. Nightmare

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A very self indulgent fanfic about Lance surviving alone, missing home, crying, bleeding and being saved by his friends.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Where I am  
> Who I am  
> I’m trapped in this bitterness  
> A lot of people walked past me  
> This place is where everyone just walked past me  
> Where I am  
> \- Who Are You by Sam King

The deafening silence and darkness of the castle was engulfed again by the sound of life as the castle’s systems restarting hummed throughout the halls. Lance, jolted awake by the sudden bright light of his room flashing on, quietly curses that he had fallen asleep but is grateful that no one had entered during that time. Placing his gun down, Lance checks the wound on his arm. Pulling away the mildly wet bandage, the dried scabs peeling off onto the fabric.

The blade wound, while it had stopped bleeding, the wound looked much worse than what he thought before.

Lance winces and almost gags at the gory sight of the exposed muscles and bone. The outer rim of the wound had turned a dark reddish-brown.

Looking to the mirror that is across from his bed, Lance’s chest tightens and heart drops at the sight of himself in the mirror. Covered in wounds and injuries that he received from his friends, the gash that he got from Keith stings and aches more in particular.

As carefully as he could, Lance gets up from the corner of the bed and limps towards his desk and opens a drawer looking for the scissors he uses to neaten up his eyebrows.

Grabbing the small clippers with a transparent glasslike sharp edge that Coran had given him when he first arrived at the castle, Lance cuts his bedsheet and tears long strips of fabric to use as more bandage.

Keeping his senses aware and his gun close in case of any sound that might hint at someone approaching, Lance carefully removes his heavily damaged spacesuit and chucking the damaged top and keeping the bottom on.

Trying to keep as quiet as he can he clenches his teeth and quietly grunts, the burn from Hunk’s blaster on his back began to sear causing him to fall to his knees and his eyes going a blinding white to black, almost passing out.

Panting and gasping heavily, sweat dripped down from his forehead as he slipped the last of the top suit off his body and began wrapping his torso and arm.

Using the wall next to his bed, Lance pulls himself off his bed and stumbles his way to his closet.

Pulling his shirt and hoodie out of his closet, Lance carefully pulls his shirt over himself slowly trying to minimize the aches and pains throughout his body.

Looking back into the mirror at the strange combination of Earth shirt and hoodie with space battle suit bottom, Lance thinks to himself, _Looking better than Starlord already._

Upon hearing footsteps clinking down the hallway, Lance’s heart begins beating fast and he quickly grabs his gun from the bed and moving into a crouch to the left of the door.

Straining to hear what the voice is saying over his loudly beating heart Lance hears the hushed whispers of Hunk walking towards his direction.

 

“So far nothing here. I’m checking the bedrooms in case he hid there.” Hearing Hunk opening the room doors slowly

 

 _Time to execute ‘In Case Something Bad Happens in the Castle and I’m in The Bedroom Plan C’_ Lance thinks as he swiftly moves as he practiced alone on one of those no “training” days.

Drifting his hand over the wall furthest from the door a holographic digital number pad appears. Punching in the Altean code that he set, the wall opens to a mini armory that he had prepared for himself. Inside he pulled out an extra space helmet and a spare spacesuit equipped just like his now damaged suit from before. Leaving the spacesuit bottoms in the compartment, Lance painfully and quickly clicks the suit top and helmet on. Preparing his gun he kneels with his gun resting on his knee and takes aim at the center of the door and waits as Hunk now closes in on Lance’s room.

What happens next felt like a never-ending slow motion sequence that happens in ticks.

The door slides open.

Lance makes eye contact with Hunk’s form.

Hunk realizes he had found Lance.

Hunk lifts his blaster.

Too slow.

Lance already at the ready.

Fires.

The powerful shot hits Hunk in the belly.

Hunk, thrown off his balance falls prone on his back and his blaster skids across the hallway.

Taking the window to escape, Lance bolts.

Jumping over Hunk and running towards the docking bay where Blue was.

Hunk’s voice can be heard yelling to the other paladins. “He’s getting away!!”

Hunk gets up and quickly as he can grabs his blaster.

Lance slides as he turns the last corner before the docking bay.

Shiro hot on his back charging at him like a bull.

Hunk yells for Shiro to duck. And he fires his blaster.

Lance hearing this quickly looks back and manages to dodge the blaster’s shot by a hairline’s width.

The door to the docking bay was now blasted open.

Lance thanked Hunk and ran through the opening.

He calls out to the Blue Lion.

Running towards him was the Blue Lion…and the Red, Green, Yellow and Black Lion.

Lance stops in his tracks.

Flanked in all directions by the Lions and the paladins making their way towards him, Lance tries to talk to Blue.

 

“Blue! It’s me! Lance! Come on buddy you know who I am?!” desperately Lance pleas.

But the Blue Lion merely growls and glares.

 

“Blue!” Lance calls out again.

But nothing.

 

“End of the line Galra!” Shiro comes up from between the Lion’s with Keith in front of Lance and Pidge and Hunk from behind him, all at arms ready to attack.

 

Looking at Shiro and Keith, Lance couldn’t find any joke or lie in their eyes.

They were really going to take him down.

If there was anything lower than rock bottom, Lance was there.

 

“Drop your weapon and put your hands up where I can see them and we won’t hurt you.” Keith says.

Lance does nothing.

He doesn’t move. His brain literally goes blank. Unable to comprehend anything that has been happening.

 

That’s when something strange happens, stranger than anything that has happened thus far.

 

Lance’s body moves on its own.

 

_Wait, no…no…no…why…why am I…I…can’t control…my…own…_

Holding his gun straight towards Shiro’s head, the paladins tense up even more.

 

“Put. The. Gun. Down.” Keith snarls edging his blade closer to Lance.

 

Lance’s body begins to shake and tremble as Lance’s emotions overflow as his fingers move over onto the trigger and fires.

 

The blast hits Shiro instantly from the short distance between them.

 

_NO!...stop…please…s-st-stop…not…Shiro…no…Keith, Pidge, Hunk…anyone…stop me…_

 

Keith yells in fury and charges towards Lance with his blade, while Pidge and Hunk move to check on Shiro.

 

_Please…please…stop…me…help me…guys…somebody…_

**_H E L P_ **

 

An overwhelming pain surges from Lance’s abdomen, just as he started to himself regaining control of his body once more. Looking down his vision doubling and blurring he sees his gun's settings and smiles with relief with Keith’s sword piercing his body. The hilt pressing down against his body.

 

Hot tears stream down his eyes as his arms lose their grip on his gun and his legs go limp.

Lance’s eyes looked into Keith’s eyes filled with fury and rage.

Out of the corner of his eye, Lance sees a black grey figure slowly getting up. Smiling he sets his eyes back onto Keith.

 

“He’s…alright…” Lance squeezes out of him letting the blood that has pooled in his lungs cough out from his mouth.

Not breaking eye contact with Keith, Lance smiles kindly and says, “I call it…the Knockdown Blast…” Lance chuckles.

Weakly placing his hand right hand on Keith’s now confused face, cupping his cheek, Lance whispers to Keith.

 

Then his arm drops and his whole body goes limp, Keith sword sliding out of his body as he falls backwards. The blood from Lance’s body pools and extends out across the bay’s floor.

 

With the help of Pidge and Hunk, Shiro rises and moves towards the fading body of…

 

“La…nce…?”

 

A quiet cracked voice was the last thing that Lance heard. He was sure it was Keith.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I just finished watching the korean drama Goblin and had a lot of feels writing this chapter to the song Who Are You.


	4. Casa

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A very self indulgent fanfic about Lance surviving alone, missing home, crying, bleeding and being saved by his friends.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for the wait!  
> So because I don't know if those of you who bookmarked (thank you if you did btw) this fic would get a notification for additions to the chapter so I just deleted reuploaded the whole chapter.
> 
> To those who read the previous version, everything before the first break is the same.

_“Lance…”_

 

“Lance!”

 

Lance falls out of his loft bed onto the hard wood floor of his bedroom with his blanket wrapped around his legs and torso. His boxer pants sliding down just enough to expose a little of his butt crack.

Rubbing the sore on his bare back where he had landed, a shadow looms over Lance.

Looking up Lance sees an older woman wearing a mustard yellow half top with ruffles at the end and at the sleeves over a long dull orange coloured smock. The sides of her long and curly brunette hair tied back loosely. This woman is his mother, Maria McClain, standing tall and with arms crossed and slightly irritated.

 

“M..mom?” Confused at what was happening Lance looks around his surroundings and back to his mother. Decorated with space and fighter planes that he got when he was younger, the familiar posters of his favourite bands. The quiet ring of his wind chime ringed out in the room as it danced in the sea breeze. He was in his room, his room in Varadero. On _Earth_.

 

“Don’t ‘mom’ me!” Maria’s voice snaps Lance back into the moment. “It’s twelve thirty in the afternoon Lance! You were supposed to pick up your brother and sister from grandma and grandpa’s at ten!” Sighing and slightly pouting her bottom lip, Maria crouches and takes Lance’s hand in hers, stroking it softly.

 

Looking onto Lance kindly she says “Look I know you are still upset that you didn’t get into the Garrison Academy but you need to move on Lance. Try again next year! And maybe if you feel that you want to do something else halfway down the road just know we’ll do our best to support in whatever you decide to venture in. But you can’t keep moping and locking yourself in your room forever ok?” Ruffling his hair she rises and turns to exit the room.

 

She places Lance’s hand down and says with a smile, “There’s lunch downstairs and don’t worry about Jason and Leia, your dad picked them up and they’re down at the shack.”

She ruffles his hair and turns, leaving the room.

 

“Mom!” Lance calls just before she’s out of sight.

 

“Hm?” Maria turns and waits for Lance to say something.

 

Blushing and pouting slightly from Maria’s words he says, “Thanks. I’ll…I’ll do my best…”

 

Staring down at Lance playfully she does an impressive Terminator impression and says, “We’ll be waiting.”

Both Lance and Maria burst out laughing and Maria reminds Lance about food and she walks down the stairs as she hums and dances to the tune of ‘Blue Hawaii’. Lance continues to smile and chuckles slightly.

 

Lance pulls his hands behind his head and stretches as he walks in an exaggerated penguin style towards his window. Dropping his arms with a big sigh he leans against the windowsill overlooking the beach and the wide blue sea that sparkled in his eyes.

 

Giving the windowsill a quick double tap he turns and starts singing his own ‘Blue Hawaii’ in a more upbeat tone as he dresses himself in beach shorts with multi-coloured fish printed on and a light blue sleeveless zip hoodie and slipped on a pair of slip on sandals. After lathering his body in sunscreen he grabs his snorkeling gear and towel and Lance jogs down the stairs and greets his mother who had continued her solo dance on the verandah with Lance’s father.

 

Heating up the cubano in the microwave he seats himself down with a tall glass of orange juice. Savoring the delicious taste of cheese and toasted bread and ham he thirstily gulps down the cold glass of orange juice and after dancing with his parents for a short while they make their way towards their food shack that overlooked the beach.

Upon noticing that his grandpa was running the shack front with Jason and Leia assisting with the food and drink service, Lance greeted his grandpa who gave him a fist to the head soft enough that it wouldn’t leave a bump but hard enough that it still hurt.

Rubbing his head from knocking his grandpa gave him for sleeping in, Lance is then assaulted from all directions by his younger brother and sister.

 

Leading Jason and Leia away from the shack business, he greets his grandma who was catching up with her friends by the chairs and tables in front of the shack. Getting a good ol’ smooch on his cheek he makes small conversation with the other older ladies, occasionally humorously flirting with them.

Waving to them, Lance joins Jason and Leia in their sandcastle making and plays with them in the sea until they get tired.

After about thirty minutes he slips on his snorkeling gear and wades into the gleaming sea.

 

In the sea’s water, as blue as the sky, swam schools of fishes and on the ocean floor laid corals. As time passes and the sun begins to set Lance floats on his back, taking off his snorkeling mask and stares up into the sky.

 

_Not even Zarkon can destroy this peaceful life of mine…? Wait who’s Zarkon?_

 

Lance’s eyebrows scrunch up at the thought to where his mind had wanders to think of the strange name of Zarkon.

 

Hmm…..Lance thought and thought and thought but nothing came to mind..

 

_I don’t know anyone named Zarkon. Maybe I should I ask Shiro or Pidge for their help—wait…who? Shiro? Pidge? Zarkon? Who-_

 

“Laaaaaance!! Grandpa and grandma are heading hooooomee!!” Jason yelled from beyond the shack.

Snapping back from his thoughts Lance smiles and swims back to shore. Running towards his family, and what little thought of doubt and questioning in his heart was immediately replaced by his immense joy of being home from wherever he had been.

 

* * *

 

 

“Oh.”

 

Still wrapped by the dolero vines, through Earth’s Pidge, Altea’s Allura and Coran as well as the many Dalverian jarelibelsis ingenuity had removed one of the many healing pods in the castle and worked tirelessly through the persistent grasps of the vines and very different technological knowledge, to place Lance in a healing pod.

Being roughly an hour since the healing pod setup was completed, Keith and Shiro volunteered to stand watch while the jarelibelsis, Pidge, Allura and Coran got some rest. With the other Dalverian’s working hard to rebuild their colony the Paladins are left to protect Lance from any of the wilderness the Dalverian woods hold.

 

Keith stands up from his seat on the cave floor and moves closer to the healing pod. Observing the wide grin on Lance’s unconscious face, a small smirk appears on Keith’s face.

 

“At least someone’s happy.” Keith says, laying his hand against the surface of healing pod softly tapping the surface.

 

“Come on Lance…wake up…” Keith furrows his brows and frowns sadly at the peacefully smiling Lance.

 

* * *

 

 

_“Wake up, Lance...”_

 

A small voice echoes and whispers softly into Lance’s ears. Bewildered Lance straightens up from cleaning one of their tables near the shack and looks around for the source of the voice that called out to him.

 

“What’s wrong Lance?” Manuel, Lance’s father, asks while handing a customer their order of drinks and food.

 

“I-It’s nothing…I just heard Keith that’s all…” Lance answers turns back and carries the dirty dishes left on the table to the shack washbasin.

 

Manuel raises and eyebrow as his gaze follows Lance’s movements to the washbasin and asks, “Who’s Keith?”

That question shook Lance to his core and petrified his body into cold stone.

 

_Keith…who is he…? He’s…_

 

As if he was underwater, all sound and sensation around Lance dulled and muffled. As if he was a thousand feet underwater, his dad’s voice seemed distant and unreaching.

The water gushing out of the tap begun to overflow out onto the shack floor and as if the shack were a tank, the area in the shack began to fill up.

The bottles of alcohol and cocktail mixtures, all the knickknacks and the dishes and glasses in the shack began to float around.

 

Looking around in a daze, Lance looked around for Manuel who had seemingly dissolved like salt into the water.

 

“Keith…” as Lance spoke him name like a whisper, like a cracked dam the water from the tap burst and so did the boundaries of the shack fishbowl and Lance’s whole world was engulfed in water.

 

The beach and ocean that were so close by merged and soon everything, the buildings, the cars, the customers, his mother, his sibilings, his grandparents, just like his father had, dissolved into the water.

 

Lance frantically swimming and grasping to their forms he began to choke. Choke on the water that surrounded him from all directions. His lungs began to fill with sweet-salty water that he couldn’t escape from. Desperately he swam up.

 

Up and up and up and up and up and up and up and-

 

_Up_

 

Until he reached outer space.

 

A large deep, dark expanse outlaid in front of him. He could breathe again. Like there was oxygen filling his lungs and not water.

 

Turning back Lance saw he was drifting away from Earth. Further and further and further away.

 

His blue paradise drifted further away. Desperately trying to swim back like he had before escaping the water, but this time instead of getting closer to Earth, he drifted further and further away.

 

Yelling out the names of his family, he reached out his hands hoping for someone to hold his back.

Yelling out to Earth for someone to reach out its hands to him, hoping to take him back.

He yelled and yelled until his voice went hoarse and cracked harshly.

But when he drifted out so far that he could no longer see Earth’s blue radiance he cried.

 

He cried but only his tears were telling of it. The collected large blobs of water on his face broke apart and drifted away into the dark expanse of the universe as he soundlessly cried, his voice too broken to make a sound.

 

He continued to drift, further and further towards nowhere.


	5. Ripples

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A very self indulgent fanfic about Lance surviving alone, missing home, crying, bleeding and being saved by his friends.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Lance, Lance, Oh Lance,  
> A dear boy such as you should not be allowed to suffer as you have.  
> Live peacefully and eternally with your eyes closed and your ears muffled.

_How long has it been?_

_How many seconds, minutes, hours, days?_

_Would this nightmare stop in this dark expanse?_

 

Lance’s body lays slack in the zero gravity vaccum of space, staring into the darkness that engulfed every corner he turned, his eyes were red from the crying. The final few droplets of his tears drifted off his tear ducts and begun to float, slightly gleaming among the stars.   
The laces of his light blue hoodie drifting in a slow dance as Lance’s thoughts tried to remember what had happened since he left his blue marble planet in a fantastical alien invasion manner. Heat and pain seared through Lance’s arm followed by a flash of a memory.

His comrades and friends attacking him.

 

“I was injured….” Remembering this Lance checked his body for the injuries that his comrades-

 

“Wait why would I be injured?”

 

Why would he? After all he was just helping his family out before the world began to drown and he was literally sucked out of the planet-

 

Planet…

 

“What planet?”

 

Lance’s heart begins to race at the thought that he couldn’t remember the name of his beloved planet…or of his parents…or siblings…or grandparents. How…he remembers their faces-!

 

“How did they look like…?”

 

Fear mixed in with anxiety crawls up Lance’s throat like a slug. His head seemed…empty-no, _devoid_ of memories of things he should know.

 

He was fighting something with someone.

He was talking to someone about something.

He was protecting something for someone.

He was-

 

“Who am I…?”

 

It’s then a LOUD AND UNBEARABLE VOICE BOOMS THROUGH THE VACCUM EXPANSE.

ITS VOICE MAKING LANCE’S EARDRUMS RING AND WHISTLE AS IT ECHOES THROUGH THE EMPTINESS.

TRYING HIS BEST TO MUFFLE THE VOICE, LANCE SLAMS HIS PALMS AGAINST HIS EARS. BUT THE VOICE JUST GETS LOUDER AND LOUDER AND **_LOUDER_**.

IT GETS SO LOUD THAT LANCE’S SCREAMS AND WAILS OF PAIN ARE INAUDIBLE AGAINST THE FADED ECHOES OF THE THUNDERCLAP VOICE.

 

And then it’s silent.

 

Ears still ringing, Lance slowly removed his hands from his head and wiped the blood that had trickled down his ears from the pressure that had rushed and pounded against his head.

Quietly and softly, a breathy whisper creeps to Lance’s damaged ringing ears.

 

_“Lance.”_

 

Transparent tendrils appear out of the darkness, their transparency making them look dark black mercury.

It wrapped around Lance’s torso, his arms and legs restraining him. It grips his inner thighs and armpits from the back forcing him to conform to its will. Finally, it wraps around Lance’s neck with long thin tendrils tight against his larnyx.

 

With his arms and legs tightly pulled against his back a large entity appears out of the darkness.

From its ambiguous and shifting figure, that glimmered and rippled as it moved, two large eyes whose gaze seemed to turn and shift like a kaleidoscope.

 

_“Young…Paladin…”_ a voice slowly and quietyly whispered in Lance’s head.

 

_“You…have been chosen…as one…who will be blessed…with the gift…of eternal freedom…”_

 

Entranced by the shifting shapes and colours of the celestial entity’s eyes, Lance stops struggling, and fighting and…he just…relaxes…and listens…his eyes…growing…heavier than they’ve ever been…

 

_“Your…suffering…will end…You will enjoy eternity…in bliss…free…from worldly…needs…”_

 

“My suffering will end…free from worldly needs…” in a daze Lance repeats their words once again before finally shutting them closed.

 

_“Yes, my child…”_ as they say this more tendrils appear and continue to wrap itself around Lance. Over, and over and over again until he disappeared, dissolved, into the darkness.

 

_“Sleep…my tired…child…forever…”_

 

The celestial entity shifts and ripples back into the dark expanse where it came from. Leaving the dark silent space, truly empty.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for the lack of updates lately!  
> Things have been crazy with my exams, going on a trip, coming back (getting over jetlag) and getting back into the rhythm of work for the summer.
> 
> The next chapter will be up as soon as possible!  
> Again, thank you all for reading and I really appreciate all the comments and kuudos you have all left me.


	6. Saving Lance

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A very self indulgent fanfic about Lance surviving alone, missing home, crying, bleeding and being saved by his friends.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Time to save the good boy.

With weapons drawn, the scientists evacuated from the cave. The Paladins stand at guard with the other Dalverian soldiers at the mouth of the cave. Amongst the commotion were the dolero plant’s vines wrapped around Lance, lashing out at the Paladins and Dalverian soldiers.

While they hacked and slashed at the sudden attack of the vines Garthwood holds her ground relaying information to the jarelibelsis who had managed to escape with their equipment.

It was then when new vines began sprouting out from the wall and engulfing Lance’s entirety. These vines were different.

A dark purple and black muck spewed from the holes they had burst out of causing the once green vines to become mud-like. Their soft enchanting lights that would lure their preys to them were now a horrific prismatic lightshow causing some of the Dalverians and Hunk dizziness and nausea.

 

The immense strength and pressure of the plants had broken the healing pod that Coran, Allura and Pidge had painstakingly pulled out from the castle and hooked up to the Dalverian technology with help from the jarelibelsis encasing and healing Lance’s wounds.

But he wasn’t given enough time to heal and his closed wounds reopened and blood flowed down freely.

 

“The dolero plants have never acted like this before?! While they are parasitic in nature, they’ve never gotten violent like this!!” Garthwood frantically yells over the commotion.

 

“The dolero plant must’ve been corrupted by something in the soil!” a smaller, squarer jarelibelsis wearing magnifying goggles relayed back through their communication device.

 

“Well someone’s got to find how to stop this thing or we’ll never save Lance!” Shiro said as he quickly grabbed a vine that was about to pierce his shoulder while Pidge quickly slashed it before returning to her own set of angry vines.

 

“I found a signal!!” One of the jarelibelsis shouted.

 

“Where!” Garthwood yelled, her voice sounding hoarse.

 

A window popped up on Garthwood and Pidge’s screens with a cross section of the cave with Lance strapped to the wall.

A small red dot laid an inch away from Lance’s nearly engulfed head.

 

“There’s a faint sign here where the most foreign energy stems from! If we can extract or destroy that, we might be able to save the Blue Paladin!”

 

“Garthwood thank you for your help. You need to get to safety.”

 

“Green Paladin, where the corruption is-“

 

But Pidge gives Garthwood a stern nod of understanding and with Pidge’s cover, Garthwood escapes the fray and awaits what will happen.

 

Pidge sidesteps, ducks and dodges until she stood in front and between Hunk and Ringwood. She quickly sends the location of the corruption to Keith and Shiro who were flanking the sides.

 

“I’ve just sent you the location of the corruption. The jarelibelsis believe that if we destroy that, we can stop the dolero plant’s trashing.”  
  
“Won’t we hit Lance?” Hunk asks noticing how dangerously close it was to Lance’s noggin.

 

“We might…that’s why this is going to be a real show of team effort.” Pidge said jumping and slicing another four more vines.

 

“You sound like you’ve got a plan Pidge.” Shiro smirked.

 

“Whatever it is I’m all up for it.” Keith said, fighting for his arm briefly with the angry plant.

 

“Lead the way Green Paladin, we shall follow.” Ringwood said with the remaining uninjured Dalverian soldiers confirming their assistance in the rescue as well.

 

“Well then let’s get to saving our Number One Sniper!” Hunk said blasting a group of vines away.

 

* * *

 

_Here’s the plan guys. The Dalverian soldiers need to keep us under cover. The vines can’t slow us down._

The Dalverian soldiers grunts and shouts echoed through the cave as they provided cover for the main stars.

 

_Ringwood, you and I need to cover Hunk while he charges and aims his blaster…_

Ringwood stands boldly firmly as he slashes and swings at the vines still mad with anger at the unfamiliar beings in its path.

 

_Hunk you need to keep your eye out for where Lance’s head is at. It’s the only marker we have to where the corruption is._

Hunk trusting in the strength of Pidge and Ringwood sets his eyes firmly on where he last saw Lance’s head, before it was fully engulfed only a few seconds ago. His finger resting far from the trigger but close enough that he wouldn’t need to fumble before firing.

 

 

_Keith you have to cut the vines around and Shiro you need to pull Lance out of the entanglement. We don’t know how thick they’ve wrapped him up so we’re counting on the Dalverian soldiers to cover them._

Keith slashes two vines almost grabbing and dragging away one Dalverian soldier and then charges in further into the fray. Shiro sees this and does the same.

With both Keith and Shiro charging into the viper’s pit the Dalverian soldiers began moving forward as well, keeping the vines off the two Paladins in the front.

 

Once close enough Keith begins slashing and hacking away swiftly but carefully, not wanting to accidentally hack off a chunk off Lance. Shiro assists the laborious action by pulling off the cut vines and throwing them off. Hoping they see the familiar white and blue suit.

 

_Once we find Lance we need to cut the vines around his crown. This is just a hypothesis but if the plant had become corrupted, maybe the life draining effects of the plant also were corrupted, that means that we could cut the connection Lance has to the plant and pull him free._

 

Hearing Keith hit a metallic surface, Shiro grabs a fist full of vines and pulls it away revealing the torso of the Blue Paladin.

Keith begins to feel the vines quickly and carefully, making sure he doesn’t get captured too, for Lance’s head. With a few slices and rips the murky prismatic colour of the crown shows and it doesn’t take long for Keith to severe the link.

All was left was for them to cut lose his other limbs and move Lance away to safety.

 

The corrupted dolero plant, however, while not itself was not about to let its prey be stolen.

It began to viciously grasp for Keith and Shiro making away with Lance’s severely injured and unconscious body.

It was not enough to damper the spirit of the Dalverian soldiers who had just had fought for their freedom.

 

Once Keith and Shiro and the Dalverian soldiers cleared the cave Pidge gave Hunk the signal and Hunk, who hadn’t taken his eyes off the crack where Lance was once connected, fired.

 

The impact was hard and instantaneous. The dolero plant’s vines shrilled and shriveled, quaking at the impact to their core.

As soon as the blast fired, Ringwood grabbed the two Paladins in his enlarged woody arms and dashed out the cave before it collapsed.

Pidge fighting off the last of the vines before they fell limp and the cave began to give in.

 

Everyone watched the last of the dust settled and waited for anything else to appear before letting their guards down.

Once the coast was clear the Dalverians and Paladins sighed and released the intensity in their muscles, some falling onto the ground from exhaustion and others from relief.

 

After gathering themselves, the Paladins began trying to wake up Lance.

 

“Lance, Lance, hey? Lance?” each of the Paladins tried but no response. Shiro crouched down and tried to listen to for a heartbeat or breathing but through the suits it was impossible. They needed to get him back to the castle. _Fast_.

 

Ringwood quickly apologized before they left and that they couldn’t do more to save Lance as the Dalverians healed naturally through regeneration. But the Paladins were thankful for all the help that they have received from the recently invaded planet. Saying their goodbyes and thanks to Garthwood and jarelibelsis as they flew off using their Lions, Lance in Keith’s, they quickly made their way to the castle where hopefully Lance could be healed in a properly hooked up healing pod.

 

* * *

 

 

**Three Earth Days Later**

 

The much needed rest from the Galra and the dolero plant had slowed the repairs of the Castle. With everyone sound asleep in their quarters the castle was quiet. Except for the humming of the machines and the occasional beeping from a computer.

A soft glow of light shone off the sides of the beige suit that Lance was changed into. Lance’s body laid in vertical stillness in the healing pod while Altean words and numbers and graphs jumped and danced on the glass seeming to be calculating something.

 

After a few moments the glass-like cover released the occupant and he fell limp onto the ground.

Slowly and groggily stirring, Lance weakly pushes himself up onto his knees and then into a sitting position on the floor against the healing pod.

 

His eyes adjusted and refocused, as the painfully bright computer monitors blinded him as he rose to his feet. He wobbled like a newborn deer. His knees week from the lack of use for who knows how long.

Lance was still confused though. He wasn’t sure where he was or where he should be going to.

All he knew was that he needed to move. His heart pounded in his chest, one of fear. Cold sweat began to drip down Lance’s back as he uses the wall to support him as he walked towards where his body remembers his room was.

 

With a light touch of his palm to the doorlock, the door slides open.

 

Memories of bloodied sheets. Searing pain. Endless agony and betrayal all rush at Lance as soon as the doors of his bedroom door open and the lights automatically turned on.

Lance’s breath grew short and his vision warped as the room begun to spin.

His body reflexively reared backwards and without the support of the walls anymore, Lance fell on his back and head hard.

 

 

Knocking him out cold again.


	7. Life is but a Dream

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Lance Lance Lance Lance Lance

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Life has been hectic.  
> Moving countries suck.  
> Thanks for the wait and all the wonderful comments.  
> Not enough Lance in S4  
> 

Darkness surrounds Lance’s body. He lays afloat in the darkness, his eyes closed. It is the most comfortable he has been in ages.

His body, heavy and tired, thought of never moving again.

Never waking up from this darkness.

And why would he? He would get hurt if he left.

He would have to endure more pain…more sorrow, leave the world where nothing can hurt him and reenter the world that wouldn’t mind tearing him to pieces.

That’s right, he didn’t have to leave. He could stay here forever.

Eyes forever shut, his world enveloped by the eternal void.

 

_“Lance?_ ” a distant muffled voice called to him.

 

_No please don’t call me._

 

_“Lance?”_ the voice was getting clearer. It was light and…familiar.

 

_Don’t make me leave this place. I don’t want to…._

 

_“Lance, wake up…”_ sadness and worry filled the distant voice.

 

It was sorrowful, worried but…warm. Filling the small cold nugget at the center of Lance’s chest. It hurt to hear it.

 

_Let me lay in this darkness forever…_

_Forever…_

 

Never hurt. Never suffer. Always-

 

_Lance?_

 

Directionless, soft and warm, it sang his name like a lullaby.

 

_Who is that?_

 

Like swimming at the bottom of a dark ocean trench, the bright sun rays barely penetrating the ocean floor. As the lights dancing, swaying in a multi-coloured wonder far from his sight, Lance closed his eyes as he felt his consciousness being pulled from the icy cold water, into the bright sunny surface by arms he knew all too well.

They lifted him towards the sun. It was painfully bright.

 

And then Lance’s eyes slowly opened, squinting as the stark light burned his eyes.

Keith’s voice cracking as he said, “Welcome back.”

 

 

* * *

 

 

It had been several days since Lance woke up.

At first Coran speculated that there might be side effects of the dolero plant’s hold on him.

The Dalverians said that there was nothing to worry about though, as the dolero plant fed off its prey’s life force while sending its preys into dreams. So as long as he was still breathing nothing should be wrong with him.

 

“There shouldn’t be any real mental effect. My best guess is that due to his biology as an Earthling, the dreamlike state became too real for him and his body merely reacted to the of the dreams.” Garthwood explained Lance’s many wounds.

 

“I say give him time and continue to monitor him but there should be nothing wrong. Trust me I’m a jarelibelsis!” Garthwood smiles wide and thumps her abdomen twice. The other jarelibelsis follow.

 

She continues, “You are always welcome back to Dalver. Until we meet again Paladins!” and with that Garthwood and the other jarelibelsis were gone.

 

So they continued.

To fight, and to save the universe.

However, Lance was seemingly the same as always. Egotistical, cocky and arrogant.

But soon the Paladins realized, Lance was growing distant. He’d grow unusually silent at times as he dazed off into the dark space. He walked with more of a slouch than usual with his head lower to the ground. When he made jokes and quips he seemed to the others that he was ‘just being Lance’, but he never met them in the eye anymore.

 

It then grew worse.

He had suddenly grown hysterical one day. Screaming until his voice grew hoarse and soundless.

It be at the randomness locations.

The bridge.

The hangar.

His room.

Once when Keith was passing by his room late at night he heard Lance yell. Keith rushed in to find Lance clutching his bayard tight in his arms shaking in cold sweat.

 

It wasn’t ok. Lance was making it seem like it was ok. And nobody noticed. No one truly noticed it, not even the most perceptive of them.

Lance didn’t experience nice warm dreams. He had experienced nightmares.

Everyone took it upon themselves to assure Lance that what he saw were just horrible, horrible effects of the dolero plant's dream toxins.

 

Lance told them the most vivid dreams. The dreams that he suffered from. Being at home, in Cuba, never have left for the Garrison. Helping out at his family’s small business. Drowning. Floating away and watching the Earth grow ever distant from his grasp.

 

He told everyone, how Keith killed him. Lance clutched his abdomen where the scar of the injury was for real. A distorted but vivid image of his body laying on the hangar ground where his blood pooled and ran down the lines of the hangar floor.

Lance sobbed. Holding his head in his hands.

 

Pidge got up from her seat on Lance’s room floor and wrapped her arms around Lance. The hug grew. Through Allura then Hunk, then Shiro, then Coran and finally Keith (But it was more of a hand on his shoulder).

They all hung around, close and within reach of Lance all the way through his heaving and crying.

Then once he was out of energy to cry anymore. He fell asleep.

Eyes swollen and red, everyone but Keith left.

 

Keith stayed by his side. Until he too fell asleep, next to Lance’s worn out body.

 

* * *

 

 

_“Are you sure?” he chuckled. Holding out two neatly braided wristbands in the air._

_A bead on each one._

_“I want you to have it,” he smiled looking at the other before laughing bashfully._

_“What?” he said as he leaned on top of his stomach in between his legs, smiling curiously._

_He looked to him and smiled. His lips moved but he couldn’t hear what he said but he felt an insurmountable feeling of happiness._

_The scene around him brightened like a flash and dimmed just as fast._

_He reached out and brushed his cheeks softly._

_He wrapped his arms around his neck as their bodies closed in together._

_Holding him tighter with every second._

_Tears fell from his eyes before he could blink them back. Worried, he embraced him tighter, soothing him. But he assured him, “Don’t worry. These tears are from happiness,” as he softly rubbed circles on his back._

* * *

 

Blinking away the tears as he wakes up, Lance sits up and dries his eyes and face from the tears.

Lance sits up and shifts his heavy body out of bed accidentally bumping Keith who had fallen asleep by his bedside.

 

Keith woke up with a slight jolt and groggily straightened his crooked back with a stretch.

 

“You know you don’t have to stay with me.” Lance said.

 

“I didn’t intend to but I fell asleep watching you sleep.” Keith answered.

 

Lance slightly blushed at how casual Keith said that sentence.

Awkwardly he lifted up his blanket got up from his bed and shuffled over to his stuff where he looked through his jacket pockets and drawers.

 

“Did you have another nightmare again?” Keith asks lethargically.

 

“Oh…no. It wasn’t a nightmare.” Lance says distractedly, rummaging through his closet.

 

“Hm, so it was a dream?”

 

“Mmm, it was I guess…” Lance turns and walk to his secret compartment across the room.

 

“What are you looking for?” Keith asks as a small compartment opens up by Lance’s wall.

 

The compartment opened and it was just an empty compartment.

 

“Lance…?” Keith who had been watching Lance move around the room, curiously peeks his head beside Lance looking into the empty compartment.

 

“Was something supposed to be inside?” Keith asks.

 

“Nothing.” Lance answers. “Or more like I dreamt that there was supposed to be something…”

 

“Hmm…” Keith hums as he turns around and sits back down on the chair that he had sat on next to Lance’s bed.

 

_Maybe I should include a mini armory with cool space pad tech in my room just in case..._

 

_“It would be helpful in case your friends choose to kill you, wouldn't it?”_ it was the same voice he heard from his dreams in the dolero plant. He looked towards Keith to see if he had heard the voice too, but he just stared back with a quizzical "Hm?" look.

 

_“The Red Paladin does not hear me. He cannot. He does not hold the gift that you have been blessed with, Lance…”_

 

“Who...are you…” Lance quivered as the atmosphere in front of him distorts and extends towards him.

 

Keith who had heard Lance’s question sat straighter and half stood off the chair, worried. “Lance…? Who are you talking to?”

 

A distortion twists and turns and solidifies into a familiar jet black tendril. They close the distance and wrap around Lance’s underarms, torso and throat, lifting his body up into the air.

Then they began to tighten. And tighten. And tighten.

 

Lance dropped to his knees and was heaving. Keith ran over to him.

 

“Lance what’s wrong?!” Keith couldn’t understand what was happening. Was it a panic attack? Did he see another nightmare again?

Keith was panicking, as Lance suddenly stopped heaving and was staring blankly into space. He grabbed Lance by the shoulder and shook him, gently at first but eventually rougher. Calling his name over and over again Lance wasn’t visibly responding.

 

Keith checked Lance’s pulse, it was weak.

 

And then he checked Lance’s breathing, there wasn’t any.

 

“This is Keith. Lance is down.” Keith said through his intercom bracelet. As he quickly laid Lance on his back and began performing CPR on him.

 

“This is Shiro. What’s going on?”

 

“Lance… _2…3...4…_ he’s not breathing _…7…8_ ”

 

 

* * *

 

 

After about an hour working to get Lance’s breathing again, Lance was once again placed into the healing pod. He seemed to have showed signs of asphyxiation, but there wasn’t any visible reasons why.

 

“There doesn’t seem to be any bruising or damage to his body. Keith was what you told us everything that happened?” Shiro asked.

 

“It’s everything that happened once I woke up. He just got up walked to his looked around his room for something, went to his closet turned around and collapsed. Once I checked on him his breathing had already stopped.”

 

“Hm…”

A moment of silence waved through the room but was cut just as quick with Hunk’s comment. “What if Lance is still experiencing the dreams he had when he was in the dolero plant’s influence?” 

 

“But the effects should have worn off when he was cut out of the plant’s system.” Allura said.

 

“What if my speculations were right…that something had affected the plant’s natural biology and that had side effects on Lance?” Coran began hinting at something that had been nagging at the back of his mind.

 

“…quintessence….” Allura gasped out.

 

“Coran...do you really think that Lance’s mind was exposed to direct contact with quintessence?!” Shiro said, his gut falling a little more down his abdomen.

 

“Quintessence is supposed to be the most potent healing energy in the universe. But the dolero plant, is a life sucking being.” Coran answered.

 

“Wait, I don’t get it…what does the dolero plant and quintessence have to do with Lance?” Keith questioned.

 

“The dolero plant’s natural state was a parasitic plant life that fed off their prey. But what if just like the Balmera planet, Lance’s body was being pumped filled with quintessence energy and then subsequently sapped of all the life force he had?” Coran explained, “if the plant was sucking out life faster than the quintessence was healing him while he was vividly dreaming, his brain must’ve reacted to the life sucking as attacks. The wounds on his body were just reactions to those attacks.”

 

“Could it be then…the real reason that the Galra were on that planet was because of their quintessence energy source like the Balmera planet?” Pidge chimed in.

 

“It seems like the main reason.” Coran agreed.

 

“If it’s the quintessence that caused this then the healing pod may not be able to help Lance,” Allura clenched her hand over her fist and stepped forward towards the healing pod. A flick of confidence and determination sparked in her eyes.

“But…maybe I could.” Allura released Lance from the healing pod, catching him as he fell.  
She lowered him gently on the ground and placed her hands on his head. Closing her eyes she concentrates like she did on the Balmera planet and her hands begin to glow. Light neon blue outlines Lance’s form and Allura concentrates on absorbing and channeling the quintessence energy. 

 

 

* * *

 

 

_“Lance.”_ A figure stands before him, their face wasn’t clear enough for him to see but it was clearly sad.

 

“Who are you? Why do you keep trying to keep me here?” Lance glances up, tired both physically and mentally, he lies on the ground.

 

_“I just want to protect you Lance...”_ the figure lies down next to Lance, familiar dark tendrils curled around their form towards Lance.

 

“You choked me out didn’t you though? I don’t think that’s protecting.” Lance calmly but clearly annoyed states.

 

_“All they want to do is hurt you…I was giving you freedom…a gift to you…”_ The more Lance asked the sadder they seemed.

 

“The gift of freedom, huh?” Lance left a beat of silence. Breathed in. Breathed out.

“I think I’ve been given too much freedom.”

 

_“…”_

 

Lance side glances at the figure and continues, “I know it may seem like I’m bound too much to the Voltron mission and that I might get seriously injured like I did before. But…I think being able to contribute to not only to the forces against the Galra Empire, but the entire universe is a pretty amazing responsibility.”

Lance turns his slightly lighter body on his side, laying face to face to them.

“You know, I was given too much freedom on Earth. So much so that I could feel myself spiraling downwards, slowly. The Paladins allowed me to keep myself from falling too far off.”

 

_“So does this mean you aren’t going to stay?”_ The figure said to him, loneliness hinting at the tip of his words. The shadows began to recede and fade. Showing the actor behind the curtains. Light brown skin. Short brown hair. Eyes like the blue sky reflected in the ocean.

 

“Yeah. Voltron needs me. And I need Voltron.” Lance says, smiling bashfully as he effortlessly rose to his elbows to his knees and finally on his feet.

 

“I think we both need Voltron.” Lance says extending his arm out to a shadowy visage of himself.

 

Shadowy Lance mirrored Lance’s smile with a little less loneliness and as the last of the smoky shadow faded away, he grabbed Lance’s extended hand. And like a supernova, the darkness was consumed by blinding flash of light.

 

With a jolt and a snap, Lance woke up and said, “Wow, that was a weird dream, huh?”

 

Everyone joyfully cheered and hugged Lance.

 

* * *

 

Many, many, many, many, many, many, days past.

Days far longer than before past.

Many battles against the Galra past.

Many planets saved past.

Days with Voltron past.

Nothing regarding the dolero plant or the quintessence effects on Lance ever happened again though.

Like everything that had happened was a dream.

 

But once in a while Lance stood on the shores of his hometown once again. Back in the Milky Way Galaxy. Back on Earth. Back in Cuba.

This was a dream of course. But once he woke up he’d feel homesick and sad.

Only for a moment though.

After all, soon he’ll be really back again.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I hope you all had a good time reading this.  
> Thank you all for your kind comments and kuudos.


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